Glutamine Glutamine is the most abundant non-essential amino acid in muscle and is commonly consumed as a nutritional supplement. Glutamine supplementation

in quantities below 14 g/d appear to be safe in healthy adults [182]; however, at present there is little scientific evidence to support the use of glutamine in healthy athletes [187]. Acutely, glutamine supplementation has not been shown to significantly improve exercise performance [188, 189], improve buffering capacity [189], help to maintain immune function or reduce muscle soreness after exercise [187]. Long-term supplementation VS-4718 solubility dmso studies including glutamine in cocktails along with CM, whey protein, BCAA’s, and/or CitM have shown 1.5 – 2 kg increases in lean mass and 6 kg increase in 10RM bench press strength [173, 190]. However, the role of glutamine in these changes CP673451 research buy is unclear. Only one study [191] has investigated

the effects of glutamine supplementation alone in conjunction with a six week strength training program. No significant differences in muscle size, strength, or muscle protein degradation were observed between groups. Although the previous studies do not support the use of glutamine in bodybuilders during contest preparation, it should be noted that glutamine may be beneficial for gastrointestinal health and peptide uptake in stressed populations [192]; therefore, it may be beneficial in dieting bodybuilders who represent a stressed population. As a whole, the results of previous studies do not support use of glutamine as an ergogenic supplement; however, future studies are needed to determine check details the role of glutamine on gastrointestinal health and peptide transport in dieting bodybuilders. Caffeine Caffeine is perhaps the most common pre-workout stimulant consumed by bodybuilders. Numerous studies support the use of caffeine Atezolizumab to improve performance during endurance training [193, 194], sprinting [195, 196], and strength training [197–199]. However, not all studies support use of caffeine to improve performance in strength training [200, 201]. It should be noted that

many of the studies that found increases in strength training performance supplemented with larger (5–6 mg/kg) dosages of caffeine. However, this dosage of caffeine is at the end of dosages that are considered safe (6 mg/kg/day) [202]. Additionally, it appears that regular consumption of caffeine may result in a reduction of ergogenic effects [203]. Therefore, it appears that 5–6 mg/kg caffeine taken prior to exercise is effective in improving exercise performance; however, caffeine use may need to be cycled in order for athletes to obtain the maximum ergogenic effect. Micronutrients Several previous studies have observed deficiencies in intakes of micronutrients, such as vitamin D, calcium, zinc, magnesium, and iron, in dieting bodybuilders [3, 17, 18, 204, 205].